Everyday but never commonplace

A Year of Yarn

This year brought much new yarn into my stash. 18,130 yards, to be precise. I used a calculator to get that number. Querido, who likes numbers, was very quick to calculate in his head how many miles are in 18,130 yards. It’s 10.3, for those of you who also need a calculator.

*wince*

Also note to self: do not tell Querido how much yarn is in the stash next year.

Before you dial the producers of Hoarders, check out how much lace is up there: the purple, navy, and blue yarns, plus the wound skein of indigo and some teal not pictured were all candidates for the High Seas shawl before I decided on the indigo.

Some single skeins entered the stash to help make stashbusting projects look like proper projects, not “I’m using all these weird yarns together because I happened to have them” projects. Some yarn, like the O-Wool (blue) and Cestari (seaglass green) were purchased on vacation.

So…why did I need all that yarn? For the Epic Seas Shawl. To give new parents a baby Alien egg and baby alien. To make Melba’s sitter a hat. For finishing my longest-running UFO ever. For Christmas gifts (sorry, no reveal on those yet. I had difficulties calculating how long it would take to ship the last one and consequently the recipient has yet to receive hers.).

I finished 26 projects last year, though, and all the rest used yarn that I already had hanging out in my stash. A small herd of Easter Bunnies. A cowl. A sweater and a vest. A beret. Baby washcloths. A shawl.

Most of these projects were small, a hundred-odd yards if even that, but taken together they equaled 10,023 yards of knitting. That’s about 5.7 miles. Only a smidge over half of what went in, but hey–knitting 5.7 miles takes a big time investment.

Although I am embarrassed to admit how much yarn I bought this year, it was also pretty empowering to be able to say EXACTLY how much came and went. If you use Ravelry but have never tracked yarn in/yarn out before, here’s my methodology:
–I tracked yardage using my Ravelry Library. This meant going back and finding yardage on some projects where I got lazy and didn’t track. Keep good records from the start, people: it will save you so much effort later. To that end, buy one of those little food scales. They’re not very expensive and they are so useful.
–If I had been good and tracked purchase dates with yardage, I could have downloaded the Excel file with yardage and date purchased. However since I didn’t, I had to sort stash by date added and record each amount on pen and paper. This only worked because I am mostly good about adding stash yarn soon after I’ve bought it. In other words, add your purchase date people.
–Only finished objects were counted in yardage knitted. This means that the Sexxxy Librarian Vest didn’t get counted.
–Finished objects that were begun in the preceding year were counted. The Holla Back Tank hung out on the needles for over a year, but it belongs to the year in which it was finished.

Now that I know I have 4.6 miles of yarn plus…a bit…in my stash, I think the only thing to do is start knitting.